Where to place adjectives

Adjectives can be placed either in front of a noun:

• There was beautiful beach there.
• Dark clouds appeared in the west.
• He made a delicious dinner. 

or after one of these verbs: be, seem, appear, become, get, look, feel, sound, taste or smell:

• Their wedding was beautiful. (was is the past tense of be)
• The sky got dark. (got is the past tense of get)
• The soup smells delicious! 

When two or more adjectives come after one of these verbs, they should be separated by and ("The sky looked dark and stormy"). When two or more adjectives are placed in front of the noun, they are usually organized in order of what they describe.

Adjectives that describe issues of opinion, like interesting or attractive, come first, and nouns being used as adjectives, like house or wedding, come last. Here is the order you should try to follow:

1. Issues of opinion (interesting, attractive)
2. Size and length (large, long, etc.)
3. Age (young, new, etc.)
4. Shape (round, wiry, etc.)
5. Color (black, ivory, etc.)
6. Place of origin (American, Asian, etc.)
7. Material (metal, paper, etc.)
8. Purpose (cleaning, magnifiying)
9. Nouns used as adjectives (house, wedding, etc.)

Here are three sentences with adjectives placed in front of nouns, in the order recommended above:

• We bought her a shiny new blue bicycle. (opinion + age + color)
• Please bring a recent photocopied college transcript.(age + material + noun as adjective)
• A gorgeous white gluten-free wedding cake would be perfect. (opinion + color + material + noun as adjective)